Starting a Conversation at The Times About Women as News Sources

The illustration from a children’s book, published in 1969, says it all about the role of women in newsrooms at that time.

“… The Story of Newspapers – before women were invented,” quipped the journalist Graham Carter on Twitter, where it recently made the rounds.

Even in the 1970s, women in most newsrooms were relegated largely to lifestyle sections – the “soft” side of the paper. But in the last few decades, the change has been huge. At The Times, Jill Abramson holds the newsroom’s top spot as executive editor, the first woman to do so. She has recently named women to roles like national editor, politics editor, culture editor and editor of the Book Review. And a look at The Times’s editorial page shows a news-side masthead – the newspaper’s ranking editors – that includes four men and four women. On the opinion side, the editor is a man and his two top deputies are women.

But what about the content of the paper? Has that diversified at the same pace?

A new study from the University of Nevada suggests that it hasn’t – or at least that the sources in front-page articles remain largely male. The study looks at two months of front-page Times articles and finds men quoted three times more than women. That’s worth thinking about. Poynter.org offers a deeper look at the study and some reporting about it by those who worked on it: The journalist Alicia Shepard and one of her students, Alexi Layton. Another student, Rochelle Richards, contributed to the research. Later in the week, Amanda Hess offered her point of view in Slate.

I talked with Susan Chira, an assistant managing editor, about the study, and about whether The Times will and should make any changes. Ms. Chira – a former Metro reporter and foreign correspondent who became the first female foreign editor of The Times – said the results of the study gave her pause. (Ms. Chira is also the author of “A Mother’s Place,” on working motherhood in America.)

“The numbers are certainly not optimal,” she said of the study. “There have got to be a lot more women worthy of quoting.” That’s true, she said, despite the fact that more newsmakers – politicians, business people, government officials – are male, and thus more likely to be in a position to be called as sources.

But, she said, she dislikes the idea of a mandate or quota for including more women. And she said some of the response to the study was overwrought.

Quotas or mandates would “result in tokenism that sets us all back,” she said. “The answer has to come from awareness. This is a consciousness issue. How do you get reporters to ask themselves if they have made a stringent enough effort to include women in this story? How do reporters expand their bank of go-to people that they rely on as sources?”

After I asked her about the study this week, Ms. Chira discussed the issue briefly with Ms. Abramson and with Dean Baquet, the managing editor. As a result, Ms. Chira said she will informally go around to section editors and heads of the various desks to make them aware of the study and suggest that they encourage assigning editors and reporters to widen their scope to include more women.

I’m not sure that’s going to make much of a difference, but I also dislike the idea of anything mandated.

Dana Canedy, a senior editor who heads a newsroom task force on diversity, said she expects that the group will have recommendations to top editors on the sourcing issue. “It’s imperative that we as journalists draw on those who reflect what this country looks like – women are not separate on this issue,” she said.

The study is limited, but it’s interesting. Talking about it may cause some resistance – and some eye rolling. “Your story quotes only men – go find a couple of women,” is a conversation that’s hard to imagine going over too well at The Times or in any newsroom. But those conversations may result in positive change: articles with a broader base of information and perspective.

Diversity for the sake of improving numbers is meaningless, an empty piece of political correctness. But diversity for the sake of including sources beyond the usual suspects – who bring different experiences and points of view – is well worth the effort.

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Liz Spayd is the sixth public editor appointed by The New York Times. The public editor works outside of the reporting and editing structure of the newspaper and receives and answers questions or comments from readers and the public, principally about news and other coverage in The Times. Her opinions and conclusions are her own. Read more »